Thank You For Playing With Me Book Launch & Exhibition Opening
Book Launch & Exhibition: Yolanda Y. Liou: Thank You For Playing With Me https://thephotographersgallery.org.uk/whats-on/yolanda-y-liou-thank-you-playing-me-book-launch Book Launch & Exhibition Opening Evening: 06:30pm - 08:00pm, Thursday Jan 25th 2024 Exhibition: Jan 26 - 28th 2024 Co-published by Stockmans Art Books Exhibition curated by Pelumi Odubanjo Exhibition prints sponsored by Image Print Centre & PermaJet “Thank You For Playing With Me” dives into concepts of modern beauty, documenting portraits of Enam Ewura Adjoa Asiama and Vanessa Russell from 2019 to 2022. This book is an intimate record of that journey. We went on the journey of transformation personally and collectively, finding our own foot in the world, career changes and moving cities, grieving the lost ones and celebrating the new life - sisterhood, womanhood and motherhood. It's a call for us all to play, to be human, and to celebrate the unique beauty that resides within each of us. ‘Her work seeks to create a safe space for women of different body types in a world that seeks to punish them. By flipping the narrative, the photographer artfully and courageously shows that in a culture that engenders self-loathing on the path to ‘perfection’ – nothing tastes as good as radical self-acceptance.’ i-D Yolanda Y. Liou (b. 1990, Taiwan) is a photographer and moving image maker based in London and Brighton, working with analogue film, digital and collage. Her work focuses on connection and to offer a broader spectrum of representation and empower people to embrace their uniqueness. She’s awarded multiple prizes including the third prize in the prestigious Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize in 2020. Her work has been published in Vogue, Nowness, Dazed, i-D, Creative Review amongst others. She has exhibited her photography in Shanghai, LA and the National Portrait Gallery, UK and has had film screenings internationally. Pelumi Odubanjo is a curator, writer and researcher based between London and Glasgow. Her research and curatorial practice build on theories of racial, gendered and diasporic studies, Black feminism, and critical photo theory. She has curated for festivals and institutions including Photo50 at the London Art Fair, Photo Oxford, Tate Exchange at Tate Modern, Brighton Photo Fringe and the Black Cultural Archives amongst others.